MARGARET NEIGHBOUR

BILL Cosby, in sworn testimony a decade ago, said he had paid women after sex to keep the affairs from his wife.

He suggested he was skilled at understanding non-verbal cues for sexual consent and called one of his accusers a liar.

The New York Times newspaper reported the revelations yesterday after obtaining a copy of a transcript from a deposition Cosby gave in a lawsuit filed by a former Temple University employee who alleges he drugged and molested her.

According to excerpts from the deposition released a month ago, Cosby admitted he procured the sedative Quaalude with the intent of giving it to young women he wanted to have sex with.

It was reported that Cosby told lawyers for Andrea Constand, who brought the suit, that he was a “pretty decent reader of people and their emotions in these romantic sexual things,” according to the transcript.

He said he offered to pay for Constand’s education and paid another woman whom he had met in 1976.

He said he funnelled money to one of the women he had sex with through his agent so his wife would not find out.

Cosby’s spokesman did not comment over the testimony.

Although Constand did not seek any money from Cosby, the comedian said he thought his wife would have known he was helping her with furthering her education but said: “My wife would not know it was because Andrea and I had had sex.”

Cosby has denied accusations made by dozens of women who claim he sexually assaulted them. He has never been charged with a crime. At points during the deposition, Cosby also described his sexual encounters with the women in detail.

The deposition also paints Cosby as emotionally charming, but he also spoke about disregarding relationships to pursue other women.

He suggested he was skilled at understanding women and nonverbal cues signalling sexual consent.

Cosby, who has been married since 1964, said he sparked a relationship with Ms Constand in the early 2000s and invited her to his house and had conversations about her family and plans for future education.

He painted their relationship as one of mentor and mentee, casting himself in the role of an experienced guide and offering her the benefit of his contacts, fame and experience.

The relationship between the two continued for several years until, Constand said, Cosby drugged and molested her in his Pennsylvania home.

Cosby said during the deposition that Ms Constand was “a liar”.

He told her attorney: “I think Andrea is a liar and I know she’s a liar because I was there,” when he was asked how he felt about Constand crying during her deposition in the case.

In the deposition, Cosby described sexual liaisons – he sometimes calls them rendezvous – with at least five women, and having a “romantic” interest in two more, in locations such as Denver, Las Vegas and New York and Pennsylvania, in hotels or in one of his homes.

In the court case, 13 women came forward with anonymous sworn statements to support Ms Constand, saying that they, too, had been molested in some way by Cosby.

But they were unable to pursue their claims in court because, six months after the fourth and final day of his deposition, Cosby settled the case with Ms Constand on undisclosed terms.

His deposition was filed away, another document in a settled court case until now.